196 New Contree, No. 79, December 2017, Book Reviews, pp. 184-197
dent, plantkenner, filosoof, skrywer, advokaat, krygsman, staatsman, versoener en vredemaker. Sy visie van holisme wat daarop gemik was om mense meer vreed-saam en harmonieus te laat vreed-saamwerk, het vir hom ’n waardevolle nalatenskap besorg wat hom laat uitstaan as een van die grootste Suid-Afrikaners van die vroeë 20ste eeu. ’n Engelse vertaling behoort ’n aanwins vir anderstaliges te wees.
Die Herero opstand, 1904-1907
(Pretoria, Protea Boekhuis, 2nd Edition, 2016, 360 pp., map,
chronology, bibliography, index. ISBN 978-1-4853-0594-1) G Pool
Andries Marius Fokkens
Stellenbosch University
fokkens@sun.ac.za
The debate on the decolonisation of university education arguably touches each academic piece written in Afrikaans, and other minority languages, for its relevance and contribution to the type of education offered to the youth. The book is a published Master’s thesis of Gerhardus Pool, which was first published in 1979 and has subsequently been reprinted in 2016. The audience for this book is small and has a limited reach beyond Afrikaans speaking readers. The style of writing is reminiscent of its era, where racial identity is strongly accentu-ated and the information is largely one-sided reports and papers written by the German administration. The colonisation of Namibia (then known as German South West Africa) impacted the inhabitants of the country greatly. Opposition to the influx and changes occurring in Namibia by the turn of the nineteenth century is expected and Gerhardus Pool delivers an academic perspective on the subjugation of the Herero’s over the period 1904-1907.
His empirical research for the book articulates archival information, mis-sionary works and personal memoirs of the administrators, military personnel and missionaries involved during the uprising. His use of German phrases and descriptions is authentic, but unfortunately limits the understanding of the reader who is not proficient in German. The research is unfortunately not supplemented with works on the Herero perspective or non-colonial critiques that provides a more balanced perspective on the event. However, the avail-ability of primary, oral and other sources to explain the side of the Herero is
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limited. The author wrote the academic work with the information available and provided insight into the suppression of the Herero not previously seen. His keen analyses of the military situation juxtaposed to the administrative position of sustainable cooperation and management after the uprising deliv-ers a poignant reminder that conflict seldom brings everlasting peace.
Credit to the author for identifying the shortcomings and trying to rec-tify the gaps in information by publishing more work on the leader of the Herero’s, Samuel Maharero (Samuel Maharero, 1991, Gamsberg Macmillan) in Afrikaans, English and German. His published work as a whole succeeds to bring to light the conditions for the uprising and the subsequent methods administratively and military respectively to suppress it. Military Historians will benefit from the academic work that describes the use of line of com-munications and tactical abilities between the opposing forces, but also place the conflict in context of its impact on society. The implications of the use of force to suppress and subdue the Herero was not lost on the rest of the popu-lation. Fire power, mobility and the supplies to keep forces fighting is the hallmark of colonial subjugation by force. The subsequent suppressive acts by the Union Government and later the South African Government after the Second World War in Namibia during the 20th century continued this tradi-tion of suppressing any acts of recalcitrance.
